Forbidden Tribe
by RenS
Summary: Kara Thrace Starbuck died in 'Maelstrom' and finds herself in unexpected places. Will she be able to realize her Destiny?
1. Chapter 1

**Battlestar Galactica (RDM)** names, characters and all related indicia are the property of Ron D. Moore, Universal Studios and Sky One. All rights reserved.

**Forbidden Planet** indicia are the property of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Incorporated.

The author (me) does not profit from the above. Only the indicia not in either of the shows/films are my property and requires permission for use by other people.

Enjoy.

* * *

_"Experience is not what happens to you; it is what you do with what happens to you." –Aldous Huxley_

Starbuck woke up. She looked around to see that she was still falling into the gas giant's maelstrom. Grateful to the Leoben-likeness for being there at her mother's death, she continued to drop into the planet and chase the Cylon Heavy Raider image. She could see that the planet's hard deck, the cloud boundary where her Viper would be crushed, was coming up.

Lightning roiled in the clouds around her. She remembered how she had repeatedly fled death. She remembered how she sought death in chasing Scar down. The difference here was that she sought death because of her despair over the belief that Sam Anders was dead back on Caprica. This time, she was ready to embrace death because she saw a new beginning in it.

She remembered the not-Leoben saying, _"See, there's nothing terrible about death when you finally face it. It's beautiful. You're free now, to become who you really are."_

She was ready to take the next step into the space between life and death as the not-Leoben put it. This was what her mother had been preparing her for through all the abuse arising from her tough love. This was what had been with Kara ever since that mandala came to her. The mandala was the supernova that pointed the way to Earth. It was also the image of this planet's maelstrom. The image of her death.

The circle was closing.

The Heavy Raider appeared briefly in the dark roiling clouds and the flashes of lightning before vanishing into the clouds in front of her. Apollo was still chasing Starbuck. She finally called calmly out to him, "Lee, I'll see you on the other side."

She could hear him telling her to wave off, to pull up away from the hard deck. Eyes wet with the peace she had never felt before, she whispered to Lee, "Just let me go."

White light filled her cockpit. Starbuck smiled peacefully and closed her eyes as she basked in the warm welcoming white light. Once more, she was the little girl named Kara Thrace.

Her Viper was being thrown about even more violently as it reached the point of no return. The hull groaned and cracked as the gas giant's atmospheric pressure began to crush her ship. Kara didn't care. She was ready.

Her Viper finally exploded.

o0o

Kara floated above the burning remnants of the explosion. She could see Apollo's Viper swerving to avoid the hard deck and turning back to the Galactica. Kara felt like smiling with love. It wasn't time for Lee to make the step even though he must love her enough to follow her in the crossing over. She had a sense of overwhelming love and peace. The light that filled her cockpit was still shining on her. It seemed to have no source. As she went into the light, it seemed that she saw five shining figures covered in bright white hooded robes. An unfelt breeze ruffled the hoods and robes.

The five figures stared at her in silence. The bright white glow of their hooded robes obscured their faces. Kara thought that they were the judges of the Underworld and the Lords of Kobol. Three would be the judges while two of them would be the witnesses who are the Lords that each person is dedicated to. So two of the figures must be Aphrodite and Artemis, Kara's patron gods, and they would testify for or against her.

All this has happened before and all this will happen again.

She was ready.

Then Kara felt herself being tugged away from the five Lords. She didn't want to go. The wonder and warmth of the five was awe-inspiring. As she went away from the shining white-robed figures, the light faded and Kara seemed to pass out.

Kara Thrace woke up. She looked around to see where she was now. The gas giant's maelstrom was gone. Instead, she was on the floor of a small metallic room with circles of white light set in regular intervals on the walls and ceiling. A glowing red strip was on one wall, facing the opposite wall which clearly contained a large door or hatch. A point of greater red glow tracked slowly down the strip back and forth. She looked down at herself. She was wearing her spacesuit which was heavily singed now. Leoben was kneeling at her side.

o0o

"So you're here too," chuckled Kara.

"All this has happened before and it will happen again," intoned Leoben, leering at her.

Kara realized that the feeling of intense love and peace was now diminished. She didn't feel dead. She also realized that this Leoben was not the guide in her vision but an actual Cylon. "Is this…the afterlife?"

It was Leoben's turn to laugh. He held up a small metallic device with control buttons. It appeared to be two rods intertwined at right angles through their middle. All of the resulting arms were equal lengthwise except for one arm which was longer than the others. "We could thank God for your resurrection. But really, we should thank God for Cylon technology. A simple application to the chest over the heart is all it takes, my dear."

It was then that she glimpsed a spacesuit tossed into a corner behind Leoben. "Frak…," Kara breathed. She realized that this Leoben was really a Cylon, not the Leoben-alike of her visions. She so wanted to go past the five figures into the Underworld and know peace forever. This must be what the not-Leoben meant by discovering the space between life and death. And if she's a prisoner of the Cylons, she'd never be able to achieve her destiny. Socrata Thrace, her mother, had prepared her for that. Dying helped her realize that. Angered by the robbery of her afterlife and of her destiny, Kara seized the device. Leoben was caught off guard. He was expecting her to still be weak from the revival. With the resurrection device's long arm, Kara stabbed Leoben in the heart.

Gasping in pain and surprise, Leoben turned his eyes toward one of the glowing red strips in the walls. "Jump," he said.

Kara realized that it was a command. If this was the heavy raider she had seen in the gas giant, perhaps it had a similar self-awareness that Cylon raiders had. Leoben likely wanted the heavy raider to jump as close to a Resurrection Ship as possible for his own survival. Though Kara embraced death, she still harbored hostility toward Cylons. If she didn't do anything, she'd be among those Cylons. And once she was, Colonials would die because of her. Her destiny would be sidetracked.

She yanked the device out of Leoben, causing him to gasp in pain as he was dying.

"Kara…," he managed to gasp out.

Kara turned to face the red glowing strip, ignoring Leoben. They reminded her of the Cylon Centurion's eye. Perhaps through the red tracking eye, she could affect the heavy raider.

She stabbed the red strip with the device. When it didn't seem to do anything except darkening a small part of the strip, she frantically pressed all of the buttons on the device. Immediately, electrical discharges arced from the device through the red strip. Ah, this must be how Leoben resuscitated her.

At that moment, the heavy raider was making its calculations for an FTL jump to the nearest Cylon presence. This was disrupted by Kara's action. She felt the familiar feeling of reality being momentarily turned inside-out as the ship jumped beyond its Red Line in an unintended direction.

**Elsewhere**

"I must have a new dress."

"Again?"

"Oh, Robby, I packed so little! There was so little time when…when—" The beautiful young blonde woman's eyes swam at the memory of a beloved father dying and their beloved world vanishing in a bright white flash. She was about to cry.

The robot said, "Miss, it has been nine days since we went out of Altair 4. Surely, you understood the length of this journey? I have monitored it to be 369 days before we reach Earth."

Altaira was now closer to crying. Sniffing, she reminded herself that Robby was a robot. He was programmed with all the needed information about the human condition, including emotions and trauma, but in the end he was just a robot. "Please, Robby?"

The gyroscopic spheres made their orbit in Robby's transparent head as he seemed to study her for a while. "Very well, Miss. I shall randomly select a dress from my memory bank. It will be ready for you in the morning."

"Thank you, Robby." With that, Altaira hugged the robot and went into the cabin that was once the captain's but was loaned to her for modesty's sake for the duration of the voyage.

"See that, Skipper?"

Commander John J. Adams knew that the bosun Randall, and acting Executive Officer, was referring to the interaction between Alta and Robby. "Yes. For nineteen years, she knew only her father and her animal friends on Altair 4. Now all that's gone. She only has us." As he watched the robot amble over to helms station, he amended, "And Robby, of course."

"Yes, sir. Can't imagine that myself. Still, we lost four men back there."

"We still have friends and colleagues in the crew."

"Yes, sir."

Adams felt the loss of these men keenly. Doc Ostrow and Jerry Farman were the closest to what he'd gladly call friends. He thought out loud, "She'll be stuck with us for over a year on this ship. Alta had an entire world to herself and now…." He turned to Randall and ordered, "Accelerate to 20c."

"Sir!" Randall was shocked. "That'll burn out the drive after 10 light years! You're worried about spending a whole 'nother year? We'd be stranded in space forever!"

"Not if we punch out a course to 61 Cygni."

Suddenly nervous, the bosun inquired, "The colony at Carillon?"

"I think it would do Alta a lot of good to practice her social skills before going to Earth. It'll keep things interesting."

"Umm." Randall shifted uncomfortably on his feet. "You sure 'bout that, Skipper? Carillon is a negro-ethnic colony."

Adams frowned. He knew about that, of course. The last global war was two centuries ago, though the ethnic strife that had its high point in the Second World War's Negro and Jewish Holocausts rippled beyond the Third World War. He idly wondered what humanity would be like without Jake Featherston, the last Confederate president and the author of the Negro Holocaust.

"Yes, I'm sure of that, bosun." Actually, Adams wasn't entirely sure. Still, Alta was innocent, even naïve if he could call her that in spite of all her education at Altair 4. Perhaps he could still protect her innocence while at Carillon.

When the bosun relayed the captain's order to the current helmsman, Robby said, "At that speed, Lieutenant, we will cover the 9.8 light years to the 61 Cygni star system in 178 days and 20 hours."

"Well!" commented James Dirocco, the ship's cook. "A bootlegger, an astrogator, a maid, a cook, and a math whiz all in one! If Earth could make more robots like it, we'd all be out of a job!"

Robby turned to look at Dirocco, gyroscopic spheres orbiting inside its head. Lights flashed in its 'mouth' as it said dryly, "Perhaps, sir, you will still assist me with oil-jobs."

Adams stifled a laugh at that. Meanwhile, Randall picked up the mike at the helms station and announced, "Attention. Bosun to crew. We will make a course change in three minutes. Stow away all breakable gear immediately. In two minutes, all hands square away to decelerate and accelerate. That is all."

"I'm setting the D.C. and A.C. fixes, Skipper," informed Randall helpfully.

Robby ambled up to Adams. "Sir, I have monitored myself to be capable of enduring the conditions of deceleration and acceleration outside the D.C. stations. I can man the helms station for the duration that you are in suspension."

Some of the crewmen who were in earshot turned to look at their captain. They knew that allowing Robby to take over meant putting all of their lives under control of a robot, something that they weren't entirely comfortable with.

The commander shared some of that sentiment. However, Robby has proven its loyalty to its human masters even if Alta likely took precedence over everyone else in the robot's view. Since Altaira would have to be in the D.C. stations with the rest of the crew to avoid injury or worse during the drop and jump through the light barrier, Robby would have to take as good care of everyone as if all were Alta. "All right. Take it away."

A few of the crewmen's lips pressed in thin lines, showing their silent disagreement. But they would acquiesce because Adams was their commander. Robby took its seat at the helms station. Soon, its scanning loops set to spinning at the 'temples' as it linked himself into the ship's computer system.

Altaira came out of her cabin. Adams raised an eyebrow. She had changed into that long white gown with emerald necklaces. "John, do we have to be in…there?" Her eyes went over to the D.C. stations with distaste.

Smiling gently and understandingly, Adams pointed out softly, "If you don't fancy possibly dying, yes."

She gazed up at the commander with trusting eyes. "All right. If only we could have something better than this."

"All hands, D.C. stations, on the double," announced Randall into the mike.

The crew scrambled into the D.C. area from all over the ship, including the upper deck. Alta held Adams' hand for a while before stepping up to one of the round platforms beside his. She took a quick deep breath as the green glow of the suspension force field covered her and the crewmen on the platforms. The light within the ship went through its spectrum as the cruiser decelerated with Robby at its helm.

Finally, the light shift ceased. Robby's scanning loops spun a little faster as it swiveled its head. It then focused on the occupied D.C. stations. The obscuring green glow of the suspension force fields faded away. The crew and Alta went through the motions of reorienting themselves through their dizziness. Some held onto a wall or crewmate for balance, some covered their eyes and others rubbed their temples or nose bridge.

The captain was the first to speak. "All right, Robby, what's the speed now?"

"We are at .14 of light speed."

That was an unpleasant surprise. "Robby, we're supposed to accelerate back to hyperspeed once we changed course."

Nonplussed, Robby responded, "I have monitored the presence of another vessel in radar-scanner range."

Adams was alarmed. As far as he knew, there wasn't supposed to be any ship in the area. It was too soon for Earth base to send reinforcements after the C-57D. It was too far off the trade and supply route between 61 Cygni and Alpha Centauri. "What is it doing here?"

"I have no data on that," replied Robby.

"Can we see it on the main view-plate?"

"It is close enough for the outboard cameras."

Randall quickly tinkered with the view-plate controls and soon, an image rippled into existence. The vessel was visible in it. It appeared to be covered in chrome more shiny and silvery than the C-57D. It was also much smaller than the 170 feet long starcruiser. A thin line of red light glowed dimly in front of a protrusion on the starboard front of the ship, if that was the front, judging by the reaction engines it seemed to have at the back. Oddly, the protrusion reminded the humans of a head.

Cookie commented, "Looks like a trussed turkey. That is, if robots like to eat metal turkeys."

Adams didn't recognize the vessel. If he didn't recognize it, chances are it wasn't human. It didn't conform to the usual United Planets ship shapes. One word came into his increasingly amazed mind:

_Alien._

"Combat stations! Blaster men, activate your scopes!"

As Alta crept up to hold onto Adams' arm for comfort, men scrambled for their battle stations. Throughout it all, Captain Adams watched with wide eyes as the vessel's red glowing light appeared to look back at him.


	2. Contact

_Destined Knight: I've longed wanted to write an nBSG fic. Then it hit me as I read Skeet's fic. Why not a crossover? I've thought about an nBSG/B5 crossover but it would too easily become complex and there are too many B5 fics at the moment. I wanted an universe where there'd be only humans to deal with (i.e. no aliens) and where the technological inequality wouldn't be too great. I chose Forbidden Planet._

_That gives me an opportunity to create an entire background society for Forbidden Planet. I decided to set it in the future of Timeline 191 (the universe of Harry Turtledove's Civil War/Confederate Victory series). That, in turn, gives me an opportunity to see how modern values compare with the values as displayed in Forbidden Planet (those of the 1950's)._

_It should be fun, I hope! Enjoy._

* * *

The saucer form of the United Planets cruiser C-57D faced a smaller chrome-plated vessel that it didn't recognize. The red glow of the saucer's engine spun in the bottom dome, giving it the power to travel and to defend itself, if necessary. To reinforce this, two points on the saucer's edge 130 degrees from each other became holes as hatches slide aside. Small gun-metal gray wands with lit bulbous heads slide out and bent to aim themselves at the other ship.

Commander J.J. Adams watched the alien vessel warily on the view-plate. His crew was scrambling to their combat posts as per his commands just seconds ago.

_Alien._

Adams considered the word, its life-transforming import. What if it was true, he wondered. What if this vessel was actually a spacecraft from a non-human civilization? It would be the single greatest threat the United Planets had ever faced. It would hold up the old horrific specter of an alien invasion. It would change humanity forever. If they were out there, then the whole human race would have to prepare to defend itself against them.

It has been speculated for centuries that there were space-faring non-human civilizations far beyond the space explored and charted by the United Planets so far. Certainly, the ruins on Mars and now the knowledge of the ancient and extinct Krell civilization attest to the existence of alien intelligences. Heck, the UP cruisers were based on designs taken from the Roswell Crash, all but confirming the existence of living non-human intelligences. UP Command sometimes worried about that.

Even so, Command has been confident that if aliens came cruising for a bruising, they would soon learn that the United Planets was a power not to be trifled with.

The commander glanced protectively at Alta. She was a civilian in a potential combat zone. And she was a woman to boot. It was unfortunate.

"Robby…," said Adams cautiously. "Dr. Morbius programmed a lot of the Krell data base in you. Is this ship…a leftover from the Krell civilization?"

"The vessel's shape and appearance does not fit any of the records that I have monitored."

"Sir," called out Dirocco, the ship's cook, quietly from his post. "We gonna eyeball that ship or cream it?"

"Commander!" called out Randall. "I'm getting a radio contact from them!"

"Let's hear it."

Everyone perked up their ears to listen closely.

"_Krypter, krypter, krypter. __Ouk oîda tua, nam eg__ṑ__ thelo boitho'sas. Krypter, krypter, krypter…."_

"They sound scared," commented Alta. "And that sounds human."

"Sound like it to me, too, Skipper," put in Randall.

"Maybe. Likely as not, they're frightened that we caught them with their pants down. I know that humans never built that ship out there," cautioned Adams. "Besides, that's no human language I've heard before."

Robby spoke up, "Sir, I am monitored with 187 languages along with their various dialects and sub-tongues. The language used by the vessel's occupants appears to be a mixture of two languages known as Classical Ionic Greek and Latin. Deciphering it is easy enough for me to translate for you. Essentially, the occupants are requesting assistance."

"You can understand this gibberish?" Adams was skeptical. He just knew that no human built that alien ship so how could a human language be spoken? Then a thought occurred to him, which made the hair rise on his neck. There were the old stories of ancient astronauts, ancient alien visits on Earth. But they had to be just that: stories.

Then the radio speaker sounded: _"Aresko!"_

"Please conciliate," translated Robby, swiveling its head.

Adams stared at the robot. This was getting unreal. Aliens speaking a dead human language understood only by a robot built with alien technology. Coming to a decision and picking up a mike, he said, "Cut us in, Randall."

Once he got the nod from the bosun, the commander held the mike over to Robby who would translate whatever he says. "United Planets Cruiser C-57D, J.J. Adams commanding. Who are you?"

"Hos ani tua?" translated Robby into the mike held by Adams.

There was an eerily human-sounding laugh as the alien spoke. _"Oh my gods, another one!"_ translated Robby, drawing puzzled looks from everyone within earshot. A series of dry coughs sounded._ "Captain Kara Thrace, serial number 462753, call-sign Starbuck."_

"Well, that certainly sounds human down to the name. But still…," said Adams in an aside to Randall. "Captain, your ship is violating United Planets space. Explain."

**Cylon Heavy Raider**

Kara was standing in a cramped cockpit-like room. She had found the door to it in her exploring the walls of her prison. She could see another small door to the right side of her, but she didn't want to go through it. Beyond it would be the cavity containing the heavy raider's brain. One experience with Cylon brains was enough for her.

She dry-coughed and tried to lick her parched lips to moisten them. She failed. It had been three days since the heavy raider jumped to this region of space and in all that time, she'd had no water. Looking through the vent-like port in front of her, Kara could see the other ship. To her, it was shaped like a hat. She had never seen it before. Perhaps it was a new Cylon ship design. After all, it superficially resembled the twin saucers of the old Cylon basestars used in the First Cylon War.

If she had a choice, she would get the heavy raider to jump away from this ship. But she needed water. And she didn't know where she was and she had no way of identifying known stars and triangulating them, not without somehow reading the heavy raider's brain. She certainly couldn't question the Leoben model which lay dead in the main chamber behind her. She remembered her mother and the Five that she saw when she died. If she were to realize her destiny, she must be alive for it. She must get out of the tomb that was the Cylon heavy raider. If that meant being a Cylon prisoner, so be it.

Still, the other ship said it's from something called the United Planets, whatever that was. They didn't seem to be familiar with the heavy raider. Whenever they spoke on the short-range wireless in the helmet of the spacesuit she'd borrowed from Leoben to replace the one ruined by her viper's explosion, they took quite a while before responding. Why?

Was this a Cylon trick?

Kara remembered the shining five figures. She breathed deeply and took the plunge.

"It's not my ship. It's…a long story. Look, can I come over to your ship? I need water."

**United Planets Cruiser C-57D**

Randall and Adams tensed at the request being translated by Robby. Alta watched the whole exchange with wide eyes, wringing the emerald necklace in her hands. She had grown up with knowledge of the Krell. She had dreamed of meeting the Krell themselves. If all went well, she would finally meet a living non-human being.

Altaira knew that this meeting would change everything for humankind. Finally, they would know absolutely that they were not alone in the universe. She wanted to meet the non-humans in the alien spacecraft. She would be looking forward to such a meeting, but she was being infected with the starcruiser crew's fear of the unknown.

"Skipper?" Randall wasn't sure if the crew would like a non-human being to come aboard their ship.

Commander Adams made a decision. "All right, get two men to suit up and give them blaster rifles. Then go below. Robby, tell him he can come aboard. But no weapons."

Randall stared. "Sir, I must protest."

"So noted." Adams looked at Randall. "We can't get anything moving without finding out about them. That means meeting them. Shall we make a bet?"

"What sort of bet?"

Adams said sardonically, "If we ever get back to Earth, let's have a big dinner for ourselves and any guests we each care to invite, up to, say, four—and it will be on me if that ship carries non-humans and on you if it carries humans."

"That's a long shot for me, Skipper. But I'm willing," said Randall.

"Done, then." Adams peered at the view-plate, trying to make out more details of the spacecraft and wondering if any details could reasonably be expected to give away, beyond question, the non-humanity or humanity of the beings on board.

o0o

A suited up Randall shut the hatch above himself. He could see that someone was turning the wheel-handle to seal the hatch. He jumped off the ladder and looked at the other two suited up men. Each was carrying a blaster rifle.

The room below the main area of the ship was more of a corridor going around a thick central column. The column contained a lot of the ship's functions and connected the astrogation and helms stations above with the main drive below. Set along the column's broad curving wall were lockers containing spacesuits for the ship's crew, and storage space for the ship's equipments.

Randall looked to make sure that the men's spacesuits were secured. Through the glass domes protecting their heads, Randall could see that Robert Grey and Joe Strong were nervous. He nodded in approval and assurance. He pressed a button in a panel on the central column. Alarms automatically blared, warning the crew that air was being siphoned out of the lower level, depressurizing it. A new light lit up on the panel, signaling that the lower level has been completely depressurized. Glancing at the two men and hoping that their nervousness wouldn't make them trigger-happy, Randall pressed another button.

One of the saucer's three leg-hatches opened, revealing the cold glare of stars in space. Fully extended, it was a stair down to the void of space. Strong and Grey stepped down onto the stair and aimed their blaster rifle straight at the chrome spacecraft hanging in the distance

The craft fired blue thrusters softly and moved to line its rear with the C-57D's hatch. A large panel in the back opened slightly, letting air hiss out of the crack.

Randall raised his eyebrows. Either that was how they depressurized or they didn't know how to do it properly. It seemed so inefficient.

After a while, obviously waiting for all the air to blow out of the craft, the panel opened down, becoming a ramp hanging out into space. Standing in the doorway was a bipedal spacesuited being.

Randall's lips tightened for a moment and then he said in a disappointed voice, "Too bad. Human."

"_Not necessarily,"_ said Adams calmly in the short-wave radio in Randall's spacesuit. _"All we can make out is that there seem to be five projections. That could be a head, two arms, and two legs—but it might not be."_

The being waved at them and then moved aside.

"Certainly moves like he has arms," commented Randall.

It was clear that the being had no way to go over to the cruiser. Randall then pulled down a small lever in the control panel and another, but much smaller, hatch opened in the underside of the saucer right beside the larger open hatch. A mechanical arm came out of it. He looked at the targeting scope in the control panel and aimed it at the other ship like it was a bulky weapon. He fired. A tether snaked out of the mechanical arm toward the chrome ship and into it. The tether's clamp banged onto the back wall of the chamber within the craft. There was the usual slithering as the tether machinery made the fine adjustments until it was motionless.

The being raised appendages to the tether and launched itself out into space.

"_It moves more rapidly and smoothly than I expected. –Ah!"_

"What, Skipper?"

"_There's some sort of propulsion. It's not rocketry, as nearly as I can tell, but neither is it hand over hand. Still, not necessarily human."_

Now that Adams pointed it out, Randall could see it: a soft blue glow emanating from behind the being's back.

There seemed an incredibly long wait despite the quick approach of the figure along the tether. Strong and Grey warily eyed it and kept their blaster rifles trained on it. Randall balled a gloved fist with tension.

Finally, the figure was inside the ship. Its tan and metallic green-gray spacesuit was of a design never seen or heard of by the humans on the C-57D, but Randall reasoned that it didn't fall outside the limits of human manufacture. The odd thing about the suit was that the helmet's metallic forehead had the vague appearance of a snake's nose. He pressed a button in the control panel once more and the leg-hatch closed. A red light lit up in the panel, signaling the siphoning of air into the lower level. Once the green light lit up, signaling the completion of the pressurization, the three men stared at the spacesuited being. A forelimb rose to the round helmet, touching something with a quick motion that Randall didn't clearly make out and the helmet was at once detached from the rest of the suit. It lifted off.

What was exposed was the face of a young and undeniably pretty white woman.

o0o

Adams, Altaira and the others watched as the wheel-handle in the domed hatch turned, unsealing it. The hatch lifted open. Robby faced it squarely, ready to stun if the being turned out to be hostile. To add to the show of force, Adams held a blaster pistol.

Randall came out first. He was grinning widely at Adams and had a glint of mischief in his eyes.

"What is it?" inquired the commander anxiously.

"You'll see, sir."

Kara Thrace climbed out after Randall.

Adams's expressionless face did what it could to look stupefied. She had a hard look about her, the kind that no woman should have in any advanced civilization. Her blonde hair was…decidedly unfeminine. He said hesitantly, "Are you human?"

Kara's eyebrows shot up. She was faced with a strange language and didn't understand the question. She had thought that they would be speaking Kobolian.

Robby obligingly translated.

Upon seeing the source of the translation, Kara shrank back in fear and whispered loudly, "Frak, a toaster! Fat and ugly, too!" Her eyes shifted to Adams' blaster and back to Robby. It was clear that she wanted to grab the gun and shoot the robot down.

"Miss?" pressed Robby. "As a robot, I am not affected by insults, but the commander here would require an answer."

Kara tensely stared up at the seven foot tall robot. "It speaks too. That's no centurion." She looked at Adams to answer his question and to avoid the disturbing specter of Robby. Striking a pose with a fist on a hip and, smirking, she said, "Don't I _look_ human?"


	3. If the Strings were Thine

Kara Thrace slept. She had gratefully drunk water and then collapsed from exhaustion. Her body needed to recover from the trauma of three days without water in the Cylon heavy raider.

Altaira and the ship's cook, James Dirocco, studied the sleeping woman, still dressed in her flight suit, in her bunk. They had all been relieved and disappointed at the same time that Kara appeared human. Robby was setting down a small device beside Kara's bunk bed. It looked like the Krell music recorder that Alta managed to grab in the evacuation from Altair 4, but with a tiny satellite dish pivoted on top of it. The robot aimed the satellite dish at Kara's head and pressed down a button on top of the cylindrical device.

"What's that, Robby?" asked Alta.

"It is a hypnopedia. After it is complete, Miss Thrace will be able to speak English with us."

"So she'll learn while sleeping?"

"Aw, no, that's fiction," scoffed Dirocco. "People can't remember what they hear while sleeping. You're pulling our legs."

Robby said, "It is true that a successful hypnopedia is beyond Earth science. Fortunately, the Krell were not limited by human imagination."

"Heeey, did that robot just insult us?" wondered Dirocco loudly.

Robby continued as if the cook didn't say anything. "The Krell knew of a way to transmit information directly into the brain."

"Neat. I gotta add 'inventor' to your résumé, eh?"

The robot merely seemed to look at him and ambled away, leaving the humans to wonder its opinion of the cook's comment.

"An oddball, ain't she?" Dirocco said, gesturing to Kara.

"Oddball?" echoed Alta. She sometimes didn't quite understand Cookie's use of the English language. Slang wasn't used often back home at Altair 4.

"Yeah. I mean, look at her. The short hair. In a spaceship by herself. A ship that no one knows about! A language no one knows. Look, a ring on her thumb. We all know that the ring's supposed to be on the ring finger. That's why it's called the ring finger! It just ain't natural."

Alta turned to look directly at Dirocco. She had detected the undercurrent of suspicion on his voice. "Cookie, what are you saying?"

"When the commander asked her if she's human, what's her answer?"

"'Don't I look human?'"

"Yeah, that's the one." Dirocco widened his eyes to emphasize his point. "She didn't answer his question."

"What?" Alta frowned and shook her head, causing her blonde tresses to bounce. She refused to accept what Dirocco was implying. "You…not saying she's…not human?"

The cook raised his hands in feigned innocence. "Just sayin.'"

Alta looked back at the sleeping form of Kara as Dirocco went away to do his job. To her, she looked human through and through even if she looked a little odd as the cook pointed out.

o0o

The ship's bosun, Randall, came up to Commander Adams sitting at the desk. "Commander? May I speak with you?"

Adams looked up from the photographic studies of Kara's ship. "Go ahead, Lieutenant."

Catching sight of the photos on the commander's desk, Randall said, "That ship's something, eh?"

"Yes, Randall. It's nothing like any ship design I've seen or heard of. It doesn't seem to have a quanto-gravitic drive dome on it. Maybe a carrier ship dropped it. Chief Quinn would be all over it the minute Miss Thrace went to sleep." The commander gave a small pained sigh at the memory of the murdered Quinn. He briefly eyed the section they were in. Quinn's torn body had been scattered and smeared all over it. "Once she's awake, we can go over it ourselves. Now that we know she's human, we can figure out where the ship came from. It could be from one of the colonies. I heard that the University of Alpha Centauri has been researching alternate ship designs."

Randall shook his head in exasperation. "The Kentish just wouldn't let it be. The saucer design that we have is the best we could ever come up with for the hyperdrive technology."

"I wish we could land somewhere so we could try contacting the authorities at Kent and getting instructions from Earth base."

Randall nodded sympathetically. In order to communicate over the light-years, they'd need to short-circuit the continuum which required a lot of power. A FTL radio wasn't standard equipment for starships so they'd need to cannibalize a ship's electronic gears and then disconnect the main drive to power the make-shift FTL radio. As it is, that wasn't possible as long as C-57D was in space.

Adams continued, "If they have dropped Miss Kara out here all alone, it's irresponsible of them and I have half a mind to report them." He looked up at Randall closely. "But this isn't what you came to talk about, is it?"

Randall glanced nervously around at the other crewmen going about their work. He sat down in a chair beside Adams. "Some of the crewmen have been talking."

"Talking?" queried the commander by way of encouragement.

"See, they're wondering why you've brought Altaira onboard."

Commander Adams frowned at that. "Altair 4 was about to blow up. Of course, I had to bring her aboard."

"Yes, well, see, Skipper, we understand that space travel is very lonely on starships. You've tried to get her to come with us long before there was any danger of the planet's destruction. Miss Alta has attached herself to you and…well, some of us are wondering if you're ah…if that's really the reason…umm…." Randall trailed off, embarrassed and not a little ashamed.

Adams' face darkened at the implication. Randall hurriedly said, "Oh, Skipper, we're not trying to rattle your cage. We're just concerned about you, that's all."

The commander slapped the top of his desk, creating a sound of angry thunder. Randall suddenly stood up straight, eyes wide. "Blast it, man! She's young, only 19 years old, pretty. I'm not blind. My God, we had no choice about having her aboard! She lost her father and her world. She's vulnerable and alone now and she deserves all the care we can give her, within proper bounds. And you're, you're—" Adams stopped talking and took a breath. "You tell the men who are 'concerned' about me that I'll have less idle talking aboard this ship! We have over a year before we get to Earth and we must make it tolerable. Not just for her, but for all of us."

"Yes, sir." Randall was now chagrined that he ever brought up the topic.

"Now that we have another woman aboard, I won't have any talk like that about _her_."

"Yes, sir."

"Dismissed."

Randall knocked heels and returned to his radar station.

The discussion was over but it gave Adams food for thought. He glanced at the closed door leading to the commander's cabin. Perhaps it was time to talk to Altaira.

o0o

"Alta."

Altaira had been morosely listening to the Krell music recorder in her cabin. The cabin was the size of a large walk-in closet, as was standard for cruisers of C-57D's type. Even so, it was a luxury that afforded privacy and modesty for anyone using it. The commander had the right to that luxury, but Adams had loaned it to her for the voyage's duration. Better that a commander sleeps with the crew in the bunk area than a woman. She looked up from the wide captain's bed. It was John Adams.

"I…well, that is, I…." The commander seemed uncharacteristically nervous.

Altaira sat up on the bed. "John, you're nervous. I've not seen you this way since I kissed Jerry."

Adams winced. The memory of Jerry Farman dying on Altair 4 was still fresh for him. Alta still had a lot to learn about human socialization. "Alta, I've been thinking. When we're done with this Kara person, we'll be on our way to either Carillon or Earth. I don't know if you can stay with us after Earth."

Alta was puzzled. "Why not? I don't understand."

"This is a military starship. The military doesn't allow wives, girlfriends or un-enlisted relatives in it."

"But, darling…." Alta looked into John's eyes and saw that he was being serious. "I chose you over my father, John. My father! Doesn't that mean anything?"

"Alta, dear…. I'm not fit for you. You wouldn't like being a Navy wife."

She was struck dumb. After a while, Alta recovered from her surprise and found her voice. "John. I just want to be with you. I'm not expecting marriage. At least for now. I just want to enjoy the love we have for however long it lasts."

It was Adams' turn to be struck dumb. Anger rose at her callous statement. "It's so easy for you, isn't it? I'm just some 'healthy stimulation'? It's not natural for a woman to treat a man like this."

"Oh no, John. I do love you! You're not just a-a…a passing fancy!" Her eyes began to fill with unshed tears.

Adams softened at her stricken expression. "I'm sorry. I wasn't thinking. We'll stay together. We have a year to think about us until we reach Earth base. Oh—" Just remembering something, the commander bent to pull a drawer from under the bed. He put a small box he found onto the cabin's tiny desk and opened it. Adams took a delicate and intricately woven scarf out of it and gave it to Alta.

"It's beautiful," breathed Alta.

"It's a head-scarf from the colony at Miraz in the Procyon System. The culture there is right out of the Arabian Nights. I know it's not French or New Parisian, but I don't have anything fit for a girl like you, but well, this scarf, it's a statement of my feelings for you. It's yours, Alta."

Looking up at Adams and still feeling the scarf with wonder, she quietly thanked him.

o0o

Kara Thrace woke up. For a moment, she thought she was in a bed in Galactica's sickbay. She could see another bunk bed above her and then she remembered that she was on the unknown hat-shaped ship. Sitting up, she felt a mild headache.

She remembered only some of her dreams. It began at the gas giant's maelstrom…a perilous voyage to an unknown planet…Kara, unprotected by a flight suit, falling into the eye of the maelstrom. During the fall, she sees in quick flashes: the mandala; Zak Adama's funeral; Cylon ships over New Caprica City; Lee Adama declaring his love for her; Bill Adama's announcement of the Cylon attack on the Colonies; Athena's Tomb; the mandala; the Cylon raider Scar; nuclear detonations on Caprica; the Cylon baby farm; her mother's death; Sam Anders; the mandala; Leoben and Kacey; the supernova at the Algae Planet; the mandala which became the maelstrom into which Kara was falling. It turned out to be a hurricane raging over a sea. She plunged into the cold sea water. She was wearing the black and grayish-blue dress that she wore at Cloud Nine on Colonial Day. Gray and pearl-white sashes trailed from her wrists and the back of her dress in the water. The wild waters roared and heaved. Kara sought to be stronger than the sea's embrace…not for her a watery end. She kicked her legs and swam up to the light glittering through the water's surface. The Shining Five staring at her in silence from within their obscuring hoods and bright light. Kara walked up a vast and empty beach, the wind whipping through her dried hair and dress, toward a lush green unknown land in the distance. She sensed a great destiny there. Speaking to the unseen Five, she said, "What country, friends, is this?"

The strange thing was that she didn't seem to speak in Kobolian or Caprican or any of the other Colonial languages. And she understood it. And it didn't feel like what she would normally say. It was like she was reciting a line from a play. How strange.

A shadow fell upon her. Kara looked up and the bulky and awkward-seeming automaton was there.

"Miss, the ship's head is to your left, through the DC stations."

She had been disappointed that this machine was the only thing that could converse in Kobolian. She preferred humans to toasters anytime. "Are you a Cylon?"

"Miss, I have no data about the label 'Cylon' so I cannot answer your question. But if you are inquiring whether I'm a robot, then yes. I am monitored to respond to the name 'Robby.'"

Kara was puzzled. She stood up. "All automatons are Cylons."

"I have no data about Cylons. I was built by Doctor Edward Morbius on Altair 4."

So this bulky and awkward automaton was the product of an illegal experiment in artificial intelligence. That was dangerous. Didn't he learn the mistakes that the Colonies made that led to the First Cylon War? She should have a discussion about that with this Dr. Morbius. She hoped that he was nothing like Dr. Baltar. Looking around at the ship's interior and the uniformed men bustling about their work, Kara decided that this wasn't a Colonial ship. The men had the look of a military organization, though she wasn't familiar with their uniform designs or with the ringed comet symbol they sported on their caps. The interior's design had lots of right-angles. The men didn't seem to share the Colonies' aversion to right-angles. Kara felt a slight childhood superstitious dread at that. If this automaton was telling the truth and it didn't know anything about the Cylons, then where did this ship come from?

She'd heard of expeditions sent by the Colonies into deep space and getting lost before the Cylons were invented by the Graystone family corporation back at Caprica. Perhaps this ship came from a splinter colony? She had never heard of any star system called Altair.

Or was it from…? She shook her head. That wasn't possible. Now, all she wanted to do was go to the head, have a nice long piss, and wash up. Questions and answers can wait. As long as she wasn't a prisoner in a gilded cage, of course.

The door to the small head was a heavy hatch-like job. Just like back on the Galactica. Except more rectangular and much narrower. She pushed down the door's lever and pulled the heavy door open. Steam and the noise of running water billowed out from behind a partition beyond the sinks and the wall of flimsy-looking closed doors.

The purpose of the doors was clear. Kara unzipped her flight suit and hung it on one of the hooks on the walls. There were white towels on the hooks as well. She went through one of the thin doors and used the toilet. All still very like the Galactica, except for the right-angles in the architecture and products. She didn't know if skinjobs used facilities like humans do. It was obvious that clankers like the Cylon centurions and Robby didn't use them.

Once she was done, she came out and took off her pants and under-clothes. It would feel so good to wash the three days or more of grime off of herself. Coming around the partition, she could see the faint form of a man in the foggy showers. Kara thought nothing of that. The man turned around to see who stepped into the shower area. Vast surprise and shock transformed his face. Hands quickly covered his privates.

He shouted angrily, "Hey! Can't you see I'm in here, lady?!"

Kara was momentarily surprised and confused by the man's reaction.

"Get out! Get out!"

Bewildered, she stepped backward.

"Get dressed!" shouted the man from behind the partition.

Confused and a little angry, Kara put on her grey sleeveless T-shirt, grey shorts and brown tank top.

"Are you decent?"

"Yes."

The man came out of the shower area, dressed in his uniform which was slowly being stained by his wet body. Kara recognized him as the man who first received her on the ship. At the time, he was flanked by two other armed men. He was alone here. He was taken aback by Kara's current appearance. "My God! You're still not decent! Have you no shame, woman?!"

She was getting angry at the man's prudery. She had thought she may have violated some custom or been rude in interrupting the man's preference to be alone in the showers. But this was going too far. "Frakwit, I'm dressed! Too bad if you can't stand the sight of a woman!"

His angry face turned a deep red. He jabbed a finger at the hung flight-suit. "Put that on! Your mother sure didn't teach you manners!"

That was the last straw.

One moment, the man was standing there, looking very angry and scandalized. The next, he was on his back, looking surprised and rubbing a spot on his jaw. Kara was staring daggers down at him, one fist balled.

Then it dawned on her that she understood this man completely. And that they weren't speaking Kobolian, either of them.

The man took advantage of Kara's distraction and ran past her. As he passed her, he growled, "You do not cream Randall and get away with it." He pushed open the hatch door and shouted for security and Commander Adams.

Which meant Kara was in trouble.

"Frak."


	4. Twixt the Heaven and the Main

_Allen Pitt: Yes, Leoben's body is stil on the heavy raider. The technological differences between Earth and the Twelve Colonies are as big as the cultural differences but they balance each other out, as you'll see._

_Forbidden Battlestar Fan: Those meetings will be after the main storyline of Kara and the C-57D. But they will happen._

_Everyone else, thanks for the comments!_

* * *

"What the hell were you doing?"

Kara Thrace glared at the man who called himself Commander Adams sitting at his table. Two armed men flanked her. In the time it took for the man she surprised in the shower, Randall, to summon security and the ship's captain, she learned that the gray-uniformed men were indeed part of a military organization. "I needed a wash."

Adams frowned at the flippant yet to the point answer. "You should have told us. You can't just go ahead and…do what you did. Not around the men. We've been in space for over a year. We have a woman with us and now you. I was hoping this wouldn't cause a problem for us in the half year it'll take us to Carillon and you just had to go and do this on the very first day!"

"How was I supposed to know there's an asshole who's scared of women in the showers?"

The C-57D's commander was stunned. Kara was clearly a woman but she obviously didn't have the manners that a woman should have in civilized society. She had what parents would call a potty mouth. The tattoos on the woman's arm should have clued him. He suppressed the urge to slap the girl. He wasn't about to show a lack of civilization to a woman who severely needs to be taught civilized manners. He decided to change tact.

"How do you know English? You didn't know any when you came aboard." Suspicion filled Adams' voice. He wasn't sure if he wanted to know the answer. Thoughts of alien intelligences swirled in his mind.

"English?" Kara frowned slightly at the unfamiliar word. So that's the name of this language, she thought. It was nothing like Kobolian, Caprican, Aerian, Gemonese or Federal Koiné. Once in a while, she thought she caught a word that sounds similar to some words at the Twelve Colonies. It took two thousand years for each of the Colonies to develop its own dialect and language diverging from Kobolian. It must be true for these people, too. "Ask the clanker over there." Kara pointed at Robby. The crew turned to look at the robot.

The gyroscopes in Robby's transparent head spun in their orbit as it regarded Kara and then Commander Adams. Lines of red light flashed in its artificial mouth as it spoke. "I monitored Miss Kara's language difficulties so I created a hypnopedia to transmit the knowledge of colloquial English directly into her mind. Did I err, Commander?"

Adams sighed. He had to remind himself that Robby was just a robot servant. "No, you didn't, Robby."

"I want to talk with your robot's maker."

Randall gave a squawk of outrage. "You can't make demands, lady! You—" He stopped at a gesture from Adams.

"Why?" asked the commander.

Kara's eyes bulged. These people really had no idea! "Making it is wrong. We had robots in the Colonies." Adams noticed a haunted yet angry look coming into her eyes. "Until they rebelled and we had to fight them off." She then glared at the impassive visage of Robby. "They came back and destroyed the Colonies."

"Oh come off it!" Randall couldn't believe they were having this conversation. They were derailing from the reason he called for security. His enraged face was red. "This woman surprised me in the shower and hit me! She's lying to save herself! She knows that there are no robots in the colonies and none of them has been destroyed! She's mad! We gotta put her away!"

A loud gunshot-like report resounded throughout the ship. Commander Adams had slammed the table with an open hand that was cupped in a way to create thunder. "I will have discipline on this ship. That includes you, Mr. Randall! One more interruption and you're going into the brig with Miss Kara."

Randall, Kara and her guards instantly stood at attention, standing straight with chest thrust forward and eyes staring straight ahead. Adams noticed the blonde woman's stand. That was distinctly military. It was impossible that she would be part of a military force due to her sex. "Miss Kara, you don't have to stand at attention. You're a civilian."

Kara's glare returned and she looked straight down at Adams. "I am Kara Thrace, a captain in the Colonial Fleet, call-sign Starbuck, serial number 462753."

The ship's cook, Dirocco, scoffed. He had been listening and watching. "She must have been quaffing my stock of whiskey."

"Whiskey, Cookie?"

Dirocco instantly regretted speaking up. He wiped his hands in his apron to buy time for himself to think. "Uh, yes, sir. For cooking purpose only, you see. I take a great pride in my duties…." He trailed away under Adams' withering look and then glared at Kara as if he blamed her.

"Miss Kara, I have heard of no Colonial Fleet. Some of the colonies have orbital guard forces, but no 'Colonial Fleet.' And I certainly heard of no woman serving in the military. The only women I've heard serving are secretaries and communication officers in the Space Service." Adams looked down at his table and shook his head. "It's a sad state of affairs if a woman serves in a military role. It just ain't right. It's simply not civilized." He looked up, suspicion once again blooming in his eyes. "On the other hand, I've heard of a few women joining pirate groups." He looked pointedly at Kara's tattoos.

Kara's nostrils flared as her glare intensified. "Sexist pig! It's a good thing your homeworld wasn't part of the Twelve Colonies! And it's Captain Thrace, not 'Miss Kara'! Give me a plane and I can best anyone here. _Sir_." She spat the last word with contemptuous venom. Adams had to admit that she pulled off the 'sir' like she had been drilled by a military sergeant. He still couldn't accept that.

"Twelve Colonies? The only colonies I know are part of the United Planets." Seeing Kara's lack of recognition of the organization he named, he clasped his hands and leaned forward. "You're not from around here, are you? You're not from Alpha Centauri?"

Now she was confused. "Where are _you_ from? Your robot said it was built by a man at Altair. You said this ship would take half a year to some world called Car—Cari—something."

"Carillon," supplied Adams.

"That's your homeworld, isn't it?"

The guards and Randall smiled. Dirocco snickered. "What? We from that Negro planet? Capt'n, Randall's right. She's mad."

Adams threw a sharp look at the cook. When he was satisfied that Dirocco would be quiet. "Tell me, Miss—Miss Thrace. What's your place of birth?"

"Ichthys City on Picon, one of the Twelve Colonies of Kobol."

Randall couldn't stand holding himself any longer. "Sir! Why are we yakking with this claptrap? She's lying! She invaded my privacy and knocked me down for no reason!"

Anger flared in Kara's eyes. "No reason?! You frakking insulted me! You're a frakker that deserves to be slapped down and taught lessons in thinking beyond your little pecker…" She smirked as she added, "…such as it is."

Adams had to grab hold of Randall before he reached Kara. Dirocco was laughing. "Stop it this instance!" barked the commander. He couldn't believe Kara's potty mouth. He didn't know the swear words she used but it was damned close to the one he knew on Earth and its colonies. "Guards, throw her in the brig!"

"Wait."

Commander Adams, when he was satisfied that Randall wouldn't do anything physical to Kara, turned at the quiet but urgent voice. It was Altaira standing off to the side. "Alta, you shouldn't be here."

She walked in closer. "But I am." Altaira looked up and down at Kara, her eyes lingering at the large tattoo on her left arm. It seemed to be a circle with a wing. Below it was an odd symbol which seemed to be a rectangular oval with a headless cross on top of it and a dot below the oval. She reached out toward the tattoos but decided against it. "You don't know where you are? Where we are from?"

Kara could tell that this beautiful young blonde woman—she couldn't be more than eighteen years old—was a civvie. She was slightly surprised at the way Altaira dressed: A black short-sleeved dress with what seemed to be tiny diamonds covering the high collar and cascading in a thin waterfall along an edge down her left side. It was a dress except it stopped right below her hip as if the maker ran out of fabric. It wasn't like the best of Caprican fashion which demanded floor-length dresses for the well-to-do but the girl looked like she was a daughter of a Sire or even a Siress in her own right.

Caprica was one of the most cosmopolitan in the Colonies, but such a skimpy dress would still be slightly shocking for Caprican society. If a woman wore such a dress, she would forever be accidentally showing her underwear whenever she sat or bent far down. With a few exceptions, only Socialators and Companions might enjoy wearing such dresses. She had to admit it certainly showed off a woman's legs and made them look long.

"No, I don't."

"Alta," began Adams, "let us do our job. This woman needs to be punished."

"Why, John?" Altaira looked up at the commander, causing her blonde tresses to shake. "Remember when I first met you Father wasn't happy about me meeting you?" Pain flashed in her face momentarily when she mentioned her father. "It was because you're from Earth. I thought you were fine exceptions. I hoped you were. I know you are. You are still exceptions, aren't you?"

Adams frowned down at the girl. Alta was the only woman who had ever made him feel like he was sent to the principal with little effort. "Alta—"

"Wait, wait, wait a frakking minute."

The men and Altaira turned at Kara's interruption. Randall and Dirocco scowled at her.

"Did you say Earth?"

"Yes," replied Altaira.

Kara's eyes widened. "Earth?" She had to make sure of it. She recalled the various names in the various Colonial languages. "Earth as in Earth, Terra, Gaia, Tellus, Chthon, the Thirteenth Colony?"

Adams said, "Sure, it is. I don't know about those other names, but yeah, it's Earth we're from. It's not a colony. It's our homeworld."

Kara gasped. Suddenly, she could hear Leoben's voice: _"All this has happened before, and all of it will happen again. You have a destiny, Starbuck."_ She remembered the mandala she painted in her Delphi apartment, the same mandala formed by the nova at the Algae Planet looking similar to the Ionian Nebula, the same mandala formed by a storm in the gas giant where her viper exploded, and finally the mandala sculpted in the Temple of Five on the Algae Planet.

A sharp pain shot through Kara's head. Grimacing and gasping, she took hold of her head. Her eyes filled with painfully bright light. Fainting, Kara fell to the deck and Adams caught her in his arms.

Altaira had stepped back in alarm, holding up a hand to her right temple.

* * *

A swirling cloud covered everything. A pinpoint of light exploded from within the cloud which quickly faded in the explosion's cleansing light. Around the explosion's source, rings of clouds formed as a new stellar system was created. Each of the rings glowed a different color: yellow, blue, red and yellow. The gaseous rings swirled in a counter-clockwise circumambulation around the central star, glowing brighter and expanding their gas until the whole thing became a colored maelstrom on a gas-giant. The central star exploded again, filling everything with white light.

When the light faded, Kara Thrace found herself standing in her helmet-less spacesuit, trembling. She was standing in a luxurious room all in white and containing décor that was clearly of an ancient period that was not of Caprica or any of the other Colonies. Unfamiliar but vibrant paintings were framed within the white walls. There was only one door in the hotel-like windowless chamber and it seemed to lead into an equally luxurious bathroom. Shakily and nervously, Kara walked into the bathroom and looked at the ornately framed mirror above the sink. She was shocked to see that she had aged to the point where she had crow's feet, lines at her mouth and gray hair peppering her dirty blonde hair. Turning back around to the door, she saw there was someone sitting at a table in the bedchamber. It seemed to be an elderly woman dressed in an ornate dressing robe. The lady's back was so like the seated back of Socrata Thrace.

Was it her mother? "Mom?" Kara whispered loudly.

The lady turned around, seemingly at the sound of Kara's voice. She was like Socrata, yet she was not Socrata. It was Kara Thrace, at a much more advanced age.

Seeing nothing through the bathroom door, a white-haired Kara went back to her well-appointed meal. She picked up a loaf of bread and broke it. Putting a small piece of the bread in her mouth, she picked up a crystal glass of red wine and sipped from it. She removed a silver dome from a bowl of soup. The soup was in the form of the mandala that figured so large in Kara's life. Frowning and staring at the image in the soup, she reached for the wine glass. She accidentally knocked the glass off the table, smashing it on the floor and breaking the silence. Looking up from the broken glass, she saw herself at a much older age, lying in what appeared to be her deathbed. She wasn't surprised.

Looking up from her deathbed, the much older Kara could see the far wall of the room. Three framed paintings were hung on the wall: one seemed to be of the goddess Aurora looking aside at either the second or third painting and seemed to be reaching or grasping in the same direction. The third painting was of the Titan Orion who didn't return Aurora's love and who was placed among the stars by Zeus. He seemed to be pointing at either Aurora or the second central painting. The second and central painting showed a planet which was beautiful to see: large blue oceans, white streaks of clouds, the green and sand-colored smudges of a large continent with the vague shape of the number seven and the pure white of an arctic continent.

Earth.

It had to be Earth. Weakly, Kara lifted an arm and reached for the image of Earth. A voice intoned, _"All this has happened before, and all this will happen again."_

A bright flash of light obscured everything.

Kara's eyes blinked as someone shone a light in her eyes. "What the frak?"

She was lying on a bunk bed and Commander Adams was shining a pen-light in her eyes.

"Easy there," he said. "You took a fall. We don't have a doctor on board." Pain crossed his eyes. "Not anymore, anyway."

Kara looked around with wide eyes. Altaira was sitting on the bed's edge, looking concerned. On her lap was a black medicine bag with a caduceus stamped on it. Kara was confused by the medical symbol. The short winged staff entwined by two serpents in the form of a helix. The Wand of Hermes was supposed to be the symbol of travel and commerce. Hermes, after all, was the messenger for the gods, conductor of the dead and protector of merchants and thieves. Shouldn't they be using the Rod of Asclepius, the god of medicine? That particular symbol was a single serpent entwining itself around a wingless staff.

Perhaps the Thirteenth Tribe has become confused with their history over the time it was separated from the other tribes.

The other tribes…. Kara remembered. The ragtag fleet looking for Earth with the Battlestar Galactica in the lead. Pursued by the Cylons. The Cylons!

"The Cylons!" Kara grabbed the collars of Adams' gray uniform.

"Whoa, whoa!" Adams was surprised by the sudden fervent action.

"No, listen! Listen." Kara glanced at the even more concerned Altaira and looked back at Adams' eyes. She had to tell them, warn them.

"The Cylons are coming!"

**Cylon Basestar 149**

"…_sapphire blue, shining like unto a star I don't care if two elements collide…the five lights of the apocalypse rising struggling toward the light don't ask me how I'll be dead in the fire of the death of the big machine thank you thank you genesis turns to its source FTL system check diagnostic functions within parameters repeat the harlot the agony exquisite fifty-two percent of heat exchange cross-collateralized with hyper-dimensional matrix…"_

A copy of Leoben, sitting on the platform around the tank built like a resurrection pod, studied the rambling Hybrid. The pale woman was lying in her tank with a biometallic hood on her head, wires and cables melding her body with the baseship. He believed that every word out of her mouth meant something and that God was speaking through her. He knew that the Hybrid has looked into the space between life and death, and she has seen things that no one else could conceive. But she has been driven mad as a result. He whispered, "To know the face of God is to know madness."

A number six model entered the Hybrid chamber. "Of course. Are you here to try and figure out what the Hybrid has to say about your lost brother?"

He looked up at the blonde model dressed in a long-sleeved and high-necked wine-red velvet tunic coat, matching knee-length skirt and black heeled boots. "This is the last place that Leoben was in. He was supposed to pick up Kara and bring her to us." He meant the gas giant that the baseship orbited now.

"_End of line,"_ droned the Hybrid. _"New paragraph. The search for the home in all her ecstasy take you back to the rapturous end and beginning without sweet union of love your sins are revealed in the light of the machine reduction occurs in stepwise reunion with the temple of the five must be measured. New paragraph. System check…"_

Number Six sat down beside Leoben. "We have detected the verteron trail. It won't be too long before we figure out the coordinates to where Leoben jumped." Six frowned slightly as a thought occurred to her. "Leoben. Why do you insist on that name instead of your number?"

The rugged blond man chuckled at the question. "None of us are unique. When one of us became Leoben, all of us became Leoben though we are still Number Two. None of the models could ever be a unique individual." He glanced at Six out the corner of his eyes. "Except for your sister."

The Hybrid droned nonstop. _"…the sins they cry for succor in the dark of the light…"_

She tilted her head and shook her blonde tresses. "Caprica Six was a hero of the Cylons. It was her who made it possible for us to defeat the Twelve Colonies so quickly. It was she who, with Number Eight, changed our plan. No other six could be Caprica. That's why we chose to remain Number Six."

"Even though you personally are beginning to prefer the name 'Natalie' for yourself?"

"I'm still Number Six," retorted the blonde. She glanced at the Hybrid who kept droning all through their conversation.

"…_the woman-child of abuse sees the five lights and the element that will clash with the elements…"_

"Kara," said Number Two simply, voicing his thoughts aloud.

"We know who Kara is," said Six. "She's special. She has a destiny. That's why we must have her with us." She stood up and held out a hand to Two. "Come."

* * *

In the basestar's control center, water and stars were everywhere. Water droplets slid down wires into pools. The reflection of the light on the droplets made them seem like falling stars. Water flowed on the central Y-shaped data-font console and spilled over the ends of the Y into holes set in the floor. This console gave the Cylons access to the datastream in the glittering red lights. Stars that didn't glitter dotted the dark dome of the control center between the curving pillars of white light. More glittering red lights flowed in a stream on the wall, separating the stars from the wall lights and the floor.

Numbers Six and Two entered the center. They could see a Five, an Eight, a One and a Four waiting at the datastream console.

Number Eight, a copy of Sharon Valerii, looked around at the assembled models. She said, "The Hybrid's deciphered the coordinates from the remains of the heavy raider's jump. It's…very far. See?"

The other models dipped their hands into the watery datastream. A normal human would feel only mild electric shocks in the water. If there's an intense burst of information in the datastream, the shock could kill the human. Cylons, however, could discern information in the electrified water without harm. The datastream relayed the information deciphered by the Hybrid directly into the models' mind.

Number Five, a copy of Aaron Doral, said incredulously, "So far away…. That's dangerous! Number Two has jumped so far beyond the Red Line! There's no way he can return to us."

Number Four, a copy of Simon, countered, "It's still possible."

Number Six agreed. "We can go find him. Retrieve him and Kara."

Eight said, "The coordinates are also beyond the Red Line for our baseship. I don't know how Leoben did it, but we cannot afford mistakes and getting lost."

"Then we'll have to push the drives and calculate the jump very carefully. God will see to our safety."

"If," amended Number One, a copy of Cavil, "that's indeed His will." His skepticism about God's existence was in his voice.

The Number Two model who is a copy of Leoben still wanted to retrieve the lost Two and Kara. "Can't we make hops to the coordinates instead of just the one jump?"

Six sympathized. "If we do that, we could easily lose the coordinates." She looked around at the models. "We make sure that the calculations are as accurate as possible. We Sixes feel we can take the chance."

The One nodded reluctantly. "Jumping beyond the Red Line is a foolhardy endeavor. I'm not sure that Kara is worth all this."

"We know she has a destiny," retorted Six. "God wants us to have that destiny."

Two pressed, "We have to get her back. Jump to the coordinates."

Eight said, "We agree. Bring her back."

One touched the brim of his fedora hat. "I think we should focus on tracking down the Colonial fleet. Kara is likely to be a lost cause. We can still catch up with the other four baseships in pursuit."

Two looked at him imploringly. One rolled his eyes exasperatedly. "Fine. We agree."

The other two models, Five and Four, nodded their agreement.

As one, the humanoid models dipped their hands into the datastream and touched palms to a data-font panel whose red glow brightened through the flowing water.

Down in the Hybrid chamber, the Hybrid said, _"As you from crimes would pardoned be, let your indulgences set me free."_ The pale woman in the tank paused, parting lips and half-closing her eyes, and said decisively, "Jump." She writhed and gasped in orgasmic pleasure.

The basestar hovered in its orbit above the gas giant and its maelstrom. The two Y sections slowly and sedately moved in their opposite directions as the baseship powered up its jump drive. A bright white light flashed as the ship jumped.


	5. Content Your Pains

WARNING: Contains a spoiler about _Settling Accounts: In at the Death_

_

* * *

_"The Cylons!" Kara Thrace grabbed the collars of John Jay Adams' gray uniform.

"Whoa, whoa!" Adams was surprised by the sudden fervent action.

"No, listen! Listen." Kara glanced at the even more concerned Altaira and looked back into Adams' eyes. She had to tell them, warn them.

"The Cylons are coming!"

Commander Adams grabbed Kara's shoulders and looked hard at her. After a moment, Kara calmed down.

"Miss Kara, who or what are the Cylons?"

The Colonial woman briefly glanced at Robby, the seven-foot, six inches tall robot. "The Cylons are a race of robots who destroyed my people's homeworlds." Kara took a trembling breath. "They want to exterminate Humanity."

Cookie Dirocco scoffed loudly. "Skipper, she's rambling. What should we do about her behavior with Randall?"

Lt. Jerry Farman leaned in from behind and whispered, "John, he's right. We have a ways to go. We must maintain discipline."

Adams considered the ship's pilot's advice. As the acting executive officer, he was within his rights to advise the commander.

Altaira Morbius softly put in, "Kara don't know us. We can't expect her to know what was happening when she woke up. She was disoriented."

"Commander?" pressed Farman.

Alta's eyes pleaded until Adams said, "Miss Kara was disoriented and surprised. We should not blame her for her actions."

Anger flashed in Randall's eyes and Dirocco noticed. However, Commander Adams turned back to Kara, dismissing the men who took the hint and left. He had made his decision. "Do you have evidence of these…Cylons?"

"Just take a look at the heavy raider I got. It's a Cylon ship."

Adams frowned. That explained the alien look of the small ship. "How did you get it?"

A mischievous smirk appeared. "They captured me. That was a mistake."

Adams studied Kara. He was convinced that she was telling the truth. He could see it in her eyes and hear it in her voice. She must be telling the truth about being in a military force, then. That was disturbing for him. He didn't want to know the circumstances that would drive a nation to put its women in the military. That somehow seemed emasculating.

Kara nervously glanced at the silently observing Robby. "Commander, do your people have other chromejobs?"

"'Chromejobs?'"

"Clankers. Toasters. Bulletheads." Kara exasperatedly gestured at Robby. "Robots."

"No" was the surprised answer. "Robby is the only one of its kind."

The Colonial sighed in relief. "Then you don't have to worry about a rebellion."

Now Adams was confused. "How's that?"

"Well, my people made the Cylons. Oh, it was over 50 years ago. At first, they were only entertainment for the rich and then they were put to labor. Servant work, do the mines, that kind of thing. Then the Colonies used them in wars against each other."

The Earth Humans were shocked. In all of its existence, the United Planets had never had civil wars. Oh, there was the Proxima War less than a century ago which was a brief conflict fought between two colonies in Alpha Centauri over mining rights in the Proxima Centauri star system. Fortunately, the United Planets Star Command put a stop to it. That was the first time the United Planets made its military might felt outside the Solar System and established the Star Command and the Space Patrol as the peacekeepers of the United Planets.

Farman sat down on a bunk facing Kara's bunk. "Makes sense. If you could save human lives and still fight wars, you'd use robots. Machines don't get tired. They don't close their eyes. They don't hide under trees when it rains and they don't talk to their buddies…. Humans have short attention span even on guard duty…. Machines know no fear."

Kara nodded. "That was the idea. They were supposed to make life easier on the Colonies. And then the day came when they decided to kill their masters."

Commander Adams found this story to be a familiar one. It was very much like the slave revolts in ancient Earth history. Spartacus, Nat Turner and Cassius Madison, the one who killed Featherston. But Kara was talking about a revolt of _machines_! "How's that possible? If what you're saying is true, these Cylons are just machines. How could they rebel?"

The Colonial shrugged. "Who knows? They developed sentience. We designed them to fight and kill in wars. It may have been only a short step to rebellion."

"What about feelings? Machines don't _feel_. A rebellion requires feelings. You need anger, hatred to rebel and kill. Machines simply can't feel!"

"Trust me, the Cylons hate us."

That simple statement put a chill through Adams. Put weapons in the hands of slaves and they would be tempted to use them to get freedom, thought Adams. However, he could not get past the fact Kara was talking about machines. Robby did not have feelings. Then he remembered Dr. Morbius' demonstration of Robby's inability to shoot Humans.

Alta was thinking the same thing. "You didn't install the safety factor," she realized aloud.

Kara laughed sarcastically. "A bit late for that. What's the safety factor?"

The daughter of Dr. Morbius said, "Robby has absolute selfless obedience and he can't harm or kill humans. He is Three-Laws safe."

They could see that Kara did not believe Alta.

"Would be nice if we thought of that. Anyway," Kara continued, "the Cylons used our technology against us so we had to go back to basics to fight them. Use weapons that didn't rely on computers. After twelve frakkin' years of war, an armistice was declared and the Cylons left to settle a world of their own."

"But they weren't done with you," said Adams. "You said your colonies were destroyed."

Kara nodded. There were sadness and anger in her eyes. "They nuked all of the Twelve Colonies in a surprise attack."

"'Nuked?'" echoed Farman. "Wait a minute. You mean nuclear? You're saying they used atomic bombs to wipe out your planets?"

In her mind, Kara could see mushroom clouds all over Caprica. "The official census showed there were over 20 billion people in the Twelve Colonies. Now we are just over 41,000, all in a ragtag refugee fleet…looking for you."

Alta's hand went to her parted mouth. Adams and Farman stared. Twenty billion down to 41 thousand! If that was true…. Now Adams had an inkling of the reason for Kara's apparent antagonism toward Robby. No wonder her government put women in the military. They were desperate.

As Adams well knew, desperation breeds drastic measures.

"Genocide!" Farman whispered.

"Robby…," breathed Alta. "Is…is she telling the truth?"

"I have monitored Captain Thrace's physiology to indicate truth."

Starbuck scowled up at the robot.

Something clicked in Adams' mind. "You said the Cylons are coming. Are they following your fleet? And they are coming here?"

Kara hesitated. "We are looking for you. Earth, really. So, yeah, I guess."

Farman looked sick. "Aw, hell."

Kara looked around at the interior of the C-57D. So far, the Earth ship's computer technology did not seem too advanced, as far as she could see. A racial memory of Pythia in the 13th Tribe? Maybe the Cylons would not be able to hack into the ship's systems. "I think you have time. How long did you say it would be to the nearest Earth settlement?"

Adams said, "Carillon? A little less than 180 days."

"So you're an exploration mission. Okay. Your planets would be far away, hundreds of light-years away. Right?"

Adams was puzzled. "Carillon's not that far. It's a little less than 10 light-years away."

Kara stared, dumbfounded. "And…Earth?"

"It's about 11 light-years from Carillon."

"Gods frakkin' dammit! I thought we have time! Now we don't!"

Farman shook his head. "If we still had the Machine back at the fatal planet, we might have all the help…."

Alta looked up at the silent Robby and looked pensive.

"'Fatal planet'? What's the frak that?"

Adams winced at Starbuck's tendency to swear. He hoped that she could be influenced by Alta's feminine graces. He did not say this aloud. He still had those genocidal machines. "Altair 4. We escaped it just before it was blasted to pieces. Maybe there's something left in the rocks, but I doubt it."

Starbuck wondered at the power needed to turn an entire planet into a bunch of rocks. If the Twelve Colonies had that power…. "Your ship would take 180 days to get to your colony and about twice that to Earth, right?"

Adams nodded. "We have to take you to Home Base. If these Cylons are coming, Star Command must be warned. You must tell us about their military capabilities."

"Their baseships are mostly geared for planetary assault, orbital bombardment and aerospace supremacy. The main danger to other ships is the missiles and the raiders." Kara shook her head. Now was not the time to do the briefing. The Thirteenth Tribe would get it soon enough. "Check the heavy raider I brought with me. Its FTL will cut down the travel time."

Farman frowned. When the hyperdrive was first developed, Earth ships could go only a little faster than the speed of light. Since then, United Planets had been slowly and steadily pushing the hyperdrive technology to greater speeds. It was slightly disturbing to learn that another human world had done more than Earth. "How fast is it?"

"It's instantaneous."

Adams, Farman and Alta stared at Kara.

"Impossible!" cried Farman, attracting looks from other crewmen in the C-57D. "You can't do that."

Adams cautiously said, "Instantaneous travel? You're yanking our chains. Moving faster than the speed of light is the only possible way for space travel."

Kara stared. If she understood correctly, the 13th Tribe mastered relativistic FTL as opposed to the Colonies' jump drive. She did not want to figure out the power requirements for such a thing. "We don't actually move faster than the speed of light. We have a shortcut that allows a ship to instantaneously jump from one point in space to another, light-years away."

"How?" asked Farman.

Starbuck looked around the crew bunk area and noticed a pinup poster on the inside of an open locker door. It showed a woman in a modest and unrevealing but comely bathing suit. The pinup stood in high heels with her back to the viewer, but she smiled over her shoulder at whoever looked at her, her hair piled up on top of her head. Kara did not think this poster would be popular among the men and women on the Galactica. By their standards, it wasn't racy. In fact, Kara thought that Alta was much more alluring with her beauty of a siress or a socialator. She ripped it off the locker door and took a pen from within the locker.

Adams refrained from protesting. The crewman who owned the locker would have to deal with it.

Kara held up the pinup poster and said, "Imagine this paper is space-time. You want to get from point A here…" She marked it on the pinup's teethy grin, making it look like someone knocked a few teeth out of the woman. "…to point B here." She made another mark, right where the legs met the pinup model's shapely rear. This caused Adams and Farman to glare with scandalized disapproval. Alta merely watched with fascination.

"Now, what's the shortest distance between two points?"

Adams instantly answered, "A straight line, of course."

"Wrong." Starbuck smirked mischievously. "The shortest distance between two points…" She folded the paper, lining up point A over point B. She thrust the pen through both points, skewering the pinup. "…is zero. That's what our FTL does: it folds space, so that points A and B coexist in the same space and time. After the ship passes through the temporary gateway or bridge, space returns to normal." Starbuck handed the ruined pinup to Adams. "Instantaneous travel. Of course, the travel time depends on the navigation calculation, the math involved, space mapping for accurate navigation and building up the needed power in the FTL drive. All together, a ship could take 15 to 20 minutes before it could jump."

"Impossible," repeated Farman, but it was in a whisper this time. He looked up at Commander Adams. "Any quantum mechanic in the service would tell you it's sheer science fiction!"

Kara scoffed with amusement. "Your hyperdrive is science fiction, too, but here we are!" She casually tossed the pen back into the open locker in the back of the crew bunk-area. "Check the Cylon raider. If we could, we can hook up the FTL to your ship."

Farman widened his eyes at the thought of instantaneous travel across the interstellar distances. "If you're telling the truth…. My God, we could see Metropolis next week! Oh ho-ho-ho, betcha the capital city's like nothing you've ever seen!"

Adams, though, looked troubled.

Kara looked up at Commander Adams. "How 'bout it? Hook up the FTL?"

o0o

The Cylon heavy raider hung in the void of space. Three grey space-suited figures and a robot slowly made their way across the vacuum to the chrome ship, using the tether that still held it to the saucer-shaped Earth cruiser. Two of the suited figures and the robot used their hands to pull themselves along the tether while the Colonial woman in a bronze and green spacesuit had hooked herself to the tether with a climbing hook and used a small thruster pack to follow the Earthers. Robby was behind her.

Starbuck would have preferred to be in front but she understood Commander Adams' concerns. Trust had to be earned, not given. Still, she was nervous about Robby being behind her. At least it was not armed and did not have weapons hidden inside, like Cylon centurions.

In front of her were the spacesuited figures of Commander John Adams, Lieutenant Jerry Farman and Crewman Harry Randall, dragging themselves along the tether, hand-over-hand. She could recognize who was who through the transparent bubble helmets protecting their heads. Kara wondered why the 13th Tribe did not use thruster packs on their space suits. Why, Robby had curled one of its hands into a ring around the tether and was moving along across space, using synthetic gravity manipulation from within its body.

Robby was the oddity of the 13th Tribe. It seemed to be much more advanced than anything Kara had seen on the C-57D. If it was the only robot to exist in the United Planets, why assign it to a minor ship that seemed to be a destroyer type? The Earthers were keeping mum about this. All that she knew was that a scientist named Dr. Morbius created Robby on a 13th Tribe colony and that the scientist was Altaira's father. Maybe she should have a little talk with Alta after this?

Eventually, the group reached the derelict heavy raider. One of the Earthers activated a flashlight as he pulled himself along the tether into the Cylon craft.

Starbuck's helmet radio crackled for a moment. _"Skipper, you gotta see this."_

When the Colonial pilot finally entered the darkened heavy raider, she saw the three Earthers standing in circle around a body.

Frak. Leoben.

When Kara stood on her feet, the Earthers were staring accusingly at her. A chill went through her as she realized that her value was taking a dive. Robby arrived in the heavy raider and stood watching all this unfold. She took a defiant stance.

"Commander Adams, meet your first Cylon."

Adams looked down at the body of a dead man sprawled on the deck. The rugged blond man seemed to be sleeping on his back, but vacuum exposure had preserved the corpse and the cause of death was obvious. Leoben had been stabbed in the chest by a blunt instrument, which was a blood-encrusted cross-shaped mechanical device currently stuck into one of the screens of the darkened display line running all around the chamber.

The commander and his crewmen had stumbled into a murder scene.

"A Cylon, Miss Kara?" Adams stepped around the body and his glass bubble helmet came to within inches from Starbuck's faceplate. "You said Cylons are robots."

Randall scowled darkly. "Skipper, she's a liar and a murderer to boot."

"That will be enough, Crewman," cut in Adams while keeping his eyes on Kara. "Well? Is that true?"

"I am a viper pilot, not a murderer." Kara crossed her arms and coolly stared back at Adams. She frostily said, "I have killed before, but I am not a frakking murderer."

"Are we back to this 'she's a soldier' nonsense again?" lamented Randall. "The only way she could kill is if she's a pirate or a murderer."

Starbuck leered lasciviously at Randall. "What? You're afraid of a chick with guns? Is that it? I've seen you naked." She held up a hand, finger and thumb held inches apart, and winked back at Adams before looking back to Randall whose face was reddening. "Keep digging your hole and you'll find out when a chick with guns could do."

"Miss Kara!" interjected Adams. "Crewman Randall's not the issue here. You are." He gestured back at the body. "This is a man you've killed. Explain that."

Starbuck took a deep breath to collect herself. "This 'man' is a Cylon. His name's Leoben."

Farman peered at the body closely. "He's no Robby, but he sure as heck doesn't look like a robot."

"He's sure as frak a Cylon." Starbuck stepped around Adams to go down on one knee beside Leoben's body. "He's a robot, just an organic one. In the 40 years since the First Cylon War, the Cylons evolved. I don't know how or why, but some Cylons now look human." She looked up at Adams who was still looking skeptical. "There are twelve models and there are many copies. They don't just look human. They actually have flesh and blood." She looked down at Leoben. "I've killed this one seven times."

Adams was very uneasy. Machines that could look human? Living machines walking among people, indistinguishable from people? They'd be perfect infiltrators. While he could understand this kind of thing being popular in a certain industry on certain planets, Adams had always thought that machines should look like machines. To create human-seeming machines that could bleed, as was obvious with this corpse, was to play God.

The commander tore his eyes away from Leoben over to Kara. Her people had created the Cylons. The Cylons, according to her, developed sentience, rebelled and evolved. What did all that say about her Twelve Colonies? What did that say of a people willing to play God?

Good God, he had only recently escaped a world where an ancient people dared think to be like unto the gods and create a civilization without instrumentalities only to be destroyed by that hubris. Prometheus, the Tower of Babel, the Krell, and, it seemed, the Twelve Colonies.

He remembered what he said to Alta when they escaped Altair 4: _Alta, about a million years from now, the human race will have crawled up to where the Krell stood in their great moment of triumph and tragedy. And your father's name will shine again, like a beacon in the galaxy. It's true. It will remind us that we are, after all, not God._

Will humanity reach that great moment much sooner than Adams thought? Will they really learn?

He looked back at the body. Was it murder to kill a living machine? Then a very uncomfortable question occurred to him: If Cylons could look, feel and think like humans, and they could bleed, do they have a soul? Adams shook his head, refusing to accept Kara's word that the body was actually a living machine. "We'll take the body for analysis. We don't have a doctor anymore so maybe Robby could help."

"Help how?" wondered Starbuck aloud.

Farman said, "There's a small built-in chemical laboratory inside Robby. If you gave it a sample, it can analyze it quickly."

Starbuck grunted and glanced back at Adams. "You don't believe me? You don't believe that Leoben is a Cylon?"

Adams thought about his answer and decided to shake his head in the negative.

"Right." Starbuck unsheathed a knife, took hold of Leoben's hand and sliced the little finger cleanly off.

Farman and Randall swore in shock under their breath at this. The woman had been so casual about it. Randall began to think that maybe he should believe her claims of having killed people before.

The Colonial stood up and held the severed finger toward Robby. The robot gingerly took it and tossed it into the mini-lab chamber. Lights immediately began blinking on his mechanical brain inside the glass dome, valves opening and closing, and his scanner rings spinning as Robby analyzed the finger.

"Well?" pressed Starbuck.

"Quiet, please. I am analyzing."

Starbuck raised her eyebrows. If Robby was a robot like the earliest Cylons in the Colonies before the first war, it was unlike any of them. Was it sentient? Or was its behavior a programmed mimicry? When the Cylons developed sentience, her people had thought they were merely mimicking human sentience. Humans do have a tendency to project human feelings and thoughts into pets and inanimate objects. The Colonies found out the costly truth when they rebelled against their masters.

Was Robby sentient or merely mimicking? The Earthers claimed that this robot was the first and only one of its kind. If Robby could already seem sentient, it said much of the 13th Tribe's potential to create their own Cylon race. Starbuck would have to watch the robot closely.

Finally, the blue-lighted voice tubes in Robby's 'mouth' lit up in tandem with its speaking voice. "The sample is indistinguishable from human down to the cellular level."

That caused the United Planets men to look sharply at Starbuck, their suspicions confirmed.

Robby continued, "However, it is not completely human on the molecular level. The sample contains more silicate compounds than what humans normally would. In the nerves, the silicates seem to be arranged into pathways. This suggests the use of nanotechnology. The musculature structure suggests that the sample's owner may have superior strength and agility to humans." The robot swiveled its head so that he seemed to be facing Adams. "Except for the silicates, strength and agility, the sample's owner is indistinguishable from humans. However, I have monitored indications of genetic engineering in the genes."

Adams couldn't think of anything to say. Robby was essentially confirming that Leoben was a robotic living machine.

"I told you so," said Starbuck. She was looking bored, but inside she was intrigued by Robby's analysis. It'd be very useful for the people back in the ragtag fleet. They wouldn't have to depend on Baltar anymore. Doc Cottle could handle it.

The three men stared down at the body as if they expected Leoben to wake up and attack them.

o0o

The demonic Id Monster broke through the Krell adamantine door leading to the Krell nursery in the Great Machine. It roared and reached for Alta. She screamed. The monster's massive claw snapped her neck. A white light instantly washed out everything and faded to black. The blackness then filled with red and orange lights filled with streams of what looked vaguely like letters and numbers. Altaira felt herself being pulled forward into the datastream tunnel and a white light shone at the end of the tunnel. She fell toward the light until it filled her.

Alta gasped as she woke in a large tub full of amniotic fluid and her head came up spluttering out of the fluid. Standing in the chamber was Robby, staring at her and somehow looking menacing. Disoriented and frightened, Alta screamed. She felt a hand clamping onto her fluid-covered nude shoulder.

Alta gasped awake. She panickedly looked at the hand on her now-clothed shoulder and looked up at the hand's owner. It was Steve, the C-57D's boatswain.

"You okay, Miss? You were yelling."

Shakily, Alta looked around at the cabin she was in. Commander Adams' cabin, on loan to her for the trip. Taking a tremulous breath, she said, "I- Yes, yes. I'm fine. Thank you. I'd like to be alone."

Steve nodded and left, closing the cabin hatch behind him.

Alta sat up on the bunk. The nightmare of seeing her father's death had changed. This time, the dream had a similar vivid feeling to the one she had in the dream about the Id Monster attacking the ship back on Altair 4. But what did the dream mean? What was happening?

o0o

Starbuck grunted as she pulled a cable covered with a slimy organic material. Adams grimaced in disgust at the sight. How could anyone create a marriage of the organic and the machine? That was just not natural. Even the Krell knew enough to make their Great Machine entirely machine.

And how could Kara stand it? Her gloved hands were covered in the slime and some bits of the slime had splashed on her helmet's faceplate. Her people may have been at war with these Cylons, but still, how could anyone stand this…mess?

Adams was not one to be squeamish. He was a soldier of the United Planets Space Patrol. But damn it, why the hell would anyone combine the organic with the mechanical?

Farman was speaking. "I wonder if these Cylons could pass the Turing test?"

Adams grimaced, this time over the uncomfortable thought brought up by Lt. Farman. The Turing test, a process of having a computer and a human communicate with an interrogator and the interrogator trying to figure out which communicator is human or computer. "I doubt we could use the Turing test on the Cylons. If what Miss Kara and Robby say is true, they have become as human as a machine could be."

"So you're saying they will pass it with flying colors?"

Adams glanced at his temporary second-in-command. "If we tested Robby, we'd know it's a machine. The Cylons, on the other hand…I honestly do not know." His eyes briefly lit upon Robby. Here was evidence that artificial intelligence was possible. The Cylons, if they were indeed as close to human now, would be evidence that there is something beyond artificial intelligence. Artificial consciousness?

He'd heard rumors about the experiments on artificial intelligence back home. As the rumors went, an experiment had gone awry on an island in Puget Sound, killing everyone involved and destroying the entire island. The experiment was continued for the first sleeper ships sent into the void beyond the Solar System. Nothing was ever heard from these ships again and the experiments were discontinued.

The commander shook his head. Why think about ridiculous rumors? The government wasn't foolish enough to do such dangerous experiments.

Robby lumbered over to Adams. "Commander, I have analyzed the sample of the material that Captain Thrace calls tylium."

Adams frowned in annoyance at the robot's insistence in using Miss Kara's military rank, but he only said, "Continue."

"The sample that she obtained from this vessel's drive system has a tremendous enthalpy to the order of approximately half a million gigajoules per kilogram, or about six times greater than Uranium-235 and 81% that of deuterium fusion."

"The hyperdrive can supply the power," whispered Farman.

Starbuck had overheard Robby's report. As she continued to tinker with the cables behind an open panel in the wall facing the front of the heavy raider, she said, "We could have used fusion reactors for FTL. But the tylium companies had such a hold on Colonial economy and had their hands in the government's pockets, so all FTL ships had to depend on tylium. Short-sighted, if you asked me, but it certainly made the companies stinking rich." She chuckled mirthlessly. "Of course, that is moot. The Colonies are gone."

That sounded a lot like the corporations that controlled vital resources on Earth before the hyperdrive was invented. Adams, in spite of himself, sympathized with her. "Not really. That means your fleet depends on tylium. It's something you must find and mine on asteroids?"

She smiled with a mischievous glint in her eyes. "That's a problem. But shortly after we left the Colonies, we came across a Cylon tylium asteroid base." She smiled more widely. "We took it out. We got enough tylium to last us several years."

Adams exchanged a meaningful glance with Farman. "So they need help. Our help."

Starbuck frowned. She did not like to admit to a non-Colonial that her people needed help, but they really did need help, especially with survival hanging in the balance and with the Cylons in pursuit. Then she grinned at a thought. She imagined a fleet of hat-shaped ships going out to meet the Galactica and the ragtag fleet. She'd like to see what the 13th Tribe could do against the Cylons.

Only one problem: if the C-57D was a typical example, that fleet would be slow. Another problem: Starbuck did not know where the Ionian Nebula was in relation to Earth.

With renewed urgency, Starbuck grabbed at another slimy cable and stuck it into an aperture.

Lights came on flickeringly and weakly. The line of displays all around the heavy raider's main chamber now roiled with red bits, except for the display ruined by the Cylon memory device she'd used to kill Leoben and hurt the raider.

"Is the…computer on?" asked Adams.

"After I trashed this thing's brain? Yeah, sure, kinda."

Adams had seen what Kara called the brain. It was a ruined mess as if someone used a blender in a lobotomy operation. He inwardly shuddered. Why play God and mix the organic and the mechanical??

"Can Robby get the information we need from this ship's computer systems? Get everything it knows? It'd be mighty helpful if we knew the navigation calculations in this thing."

Starbuck looked up at Robby. The robot was not a Cylon but how long would that last? She shrugged. "It could try."

Randall said, "Are we sure about this, Skipper? I don't trust this lady."

Adams thought that Randall had a point. But…. "We need intelligence." The commander gestured at the open panel. "Robby."

The robot waddled close to the front wall. The red lights of the display played on him. The lights seemed to brighten slightly and they rose to meet his transparent head.

"I am monitoring a wireless link being made by the vessel's systems."

Kara tensed. She had assumed that Robby would need to stick a cable in itself, but the Cylons were apparently capable of wireless interfaces. She warily watched the red lights playing on Robby's head. The valves in its head opened and shut while colored lights blinked and danced.

"Synchronizing with datastream."

Did Robby's voice change?

Even Adams and Farman noticed the odd inflection. Was it an artifact of the wireless link?

Robby swiveled his head, red lights playing on it. "Datastream synchronization complete. Downloading navigation programs. FTL systems check, diagnostic functions within parameters. Begin reintegration of command subroutines. Downloading starcharts." The robot's scanner rings now began to spin as he seemed to look away in another direction and remained looking in that direction. Adams could swear that Robby was looking straight at the Altair star. It was becoming creepy for all of them.

"Contact. Contact. Contact. Hybrid 149 is online and requesting IFF codes."

"Frak!" Starbuck launched herself into Robby, causing the massive robot to topple over heavily. The deck reverberated soundlessly.

Robby instantly fell silent, his scanner rings slowing down to a stop.

Silence reigned in the heavy raider. The red lights of the line of displays continued to molt, move, and play.

With wide eyes, Randall was the first to speak. "Wha-wha-what does all this mean?"

Kara stared down at the prostrate Robby with wide eyes. She did not answer, but she knew what Robby's last utterance meant.

A Cylon basestar was in the area.

Was it too late?


End file.
